Tsipras says government wants manufacturing to reach 12 pct of GDP in ‘medium-term’
Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras said on Monday the government wants Greek manufacturing to contribute 12 percent of the country's GDP “in the medium-term,” in a speech at the general assembly of the Federation of Industries of Northern Greece (SBBE), in Thessaloniki.
“We want the Greek industry to play a leading role in the Greek economy's outward-looking re-orientation, and our aim is for its contribution in the GDP to reach 12 percent in the medium-term,” he said according to the state-run Athens-Macedonian News Agency, without adding more details.
To this effect, he said the government is considering a proposal by SBBE to establish a separate ministry for industry to promote “targeted policies and the quick resolution of bureaucratic hurdles.”
Commenting on the deal reached last month between Greece and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) on the latter's name, Tsipras said resolving the decades-old name dispute is the only way to boost Thessaloniki's regional role in the Balkans.
“Those who know well the positions of both sides in the last 25 years know, and you are among those who know, that the agreement is in the right direction, [that] it is the best the Greek government has held in its hands in those 25 years,” he said.
